


Break The Silence Open Wide

by paperxcrowns



Series: whumptober/whumpwinter 2020 [2]
Category: The Dark Artifices Series - Cassandra Clare, The Wicked Powers Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Author Is Sleep Deprived, M/M, The Cohort - Freeform, Whump, Whumptober 2020, author needs coffee and sleep, couldve done better but im tired so here yall go, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-23
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:54:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27168220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paperxcrowns/pseuds/paperxcrowns
Summary: day 3: forced to their kneeskit is the First Heir and this interests quite a few people, including the Cohort.
Relationships: Jem Carstairs & Kit Rook, Tessa Gray & Kit Rook
Series: whumptober/whumpwinter 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1972915
Comments: 4
Kudos: 31
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Break The Silence Open Wide

**Author's Note:**

> am i planning to make every title for this series Bastille song lyrics? yeah. why? because apocalypsecore.

Kit was expecting to wake up in his bed back in Devon to sunlight filtering softly through the gap in the curtains. He definitely wasn’t expecting to wake up to a sharp slap across the face. His head moved with the slap, and he felt dizzy for a second.

“Where’m’ I?” he mumbled, letting his head lull back down against his chest.

A hand twisted itself in his hair and pulled his head upright, shooting a burst of pain down his body that woke up, and that was before someone splashed ice cold water on his face.

“Wake up,” a voice growled. “We don’t have all day.”

Kit spluttered. “What the fuck?” he asked, indignantly. “I was awake!”

His eyes finally focused and he recognized the face of Cohort members. There was Manuel and Zara and some others he recognized but didn’t remember their names as well as a few he didn’t recognize.

He raised an eyebrow. “What is this? The bigot convention? I doubt I really belong here, sorry.”

A girl rolled her eyes. “He’s definitely a Herondale.”

“And you’re definitely an asshole,” he shot back. “What else is new?”

The hand dropped his hair, for which Kit was very grateful-- it had pulled and strained against his scalp painfully-- but drew their arm back to punch him in the face. Kit grunted, mostly in surprise, as stars exploded across his vision.

“Ow,” he mumbled, running his tongue over his split lip.

He looked around, trying to guess where they were. They definitely were underground, the air cold and damp, and he couldn’t hear anything past the stone walls-- no cars or birds or anything that might indicate where he was. He really hoped they were deep underground rather than in a remote location. That would really suck. He was tied to a chair, too, with rope binding his wrists together and his ankles to the legs of the chair.

“So are you going to tell me why I have the esteemed pleasure of being in your company?” he asked Zara, his words flat and unamused.

She came up to him and looked down at him. He glared at her. Three years hadn’t done much to her. Her face was a little more sharp, less round, her eyes colder, and her hair was tied back in two fishtail braids. Kit genuinely hoped she’d hated being locked in Idris for three years with only Manuel to keep her company. Maybe she’d gone insane.

Zara shook her head. “Shadowhunters have been led astray,” she began. Kit rolled his eyes and settled back in his chair, ready to zone out of her monologue. “Because of the Blackthorns and Rosales, downworlder sympathisers from the start. And the Lightwoods--” she curled her mouth in disgust.

“Alec got married to Magnus the day you sealed Idris,” Kit added helpfully, fighting to keep from grinning.

Zara’s hazel eyes darkened in anger, but her face remained neutral. She knew already, clearly, but Kit was very glad to remind her.

“But Herondales--”

“Will Herondale married a _half_ warlock. It doesn’t count.”

“I’m not talking about that,” Zara hissed, leaning forward. “I’m talking about you.”

Kit’s heart stuttered to a top, but he kept his face blank. “Would you care to be a little more specific than that, please?”

“The Lost Herondale line. Intriguing, that they all remained hidden. Even more interesting that a descendent of Tobias Herondale married a faerie. Not any kind of faerie, mind you. The First Heir.”

There was a beat of silence. Kit’s heart was hammering in his chest and he was glad for the lack of lighting, because his face was sheet white. He swallowed back the rising fear. This was fine. He was a Shadowhunter. He could take them.

“And I’m supposed to know who the First Heir is? This isn’t a game show.”

Zara smirked. “Don’t lie. You know who the First Heir is.”

He did. He knew. He had powers he shouldn’t, and if word ever got around, he’d make a lot of people very angry, or very interested in finding him and using him. He’d tried his very best to avoid people he could potentially get in danger or killed. Except Jem and Tessa. They refused to let him leave. He hadn’t dared to talk to any of the Blackthorns or Emma. He didn’t want to get them involved. He didn’t want to get Ty involved. He ignored the pain in his chest at the thought of Ty. he’d asked Tessa if the pain would ever leave. She told him it wouldn’t-- first love usually did that to a person. It nagged and nagged and stayed and would always hurt.

But here, Kit was alone. His isolation had paid off. He dropped the facade and scowled.

“What the fuck do you want with me, then? You want to get rid of impurities, right? I’m just another one.”

He resisted the urge to call himself a Mudblood-- no one would get the reference. His talents were wasted on them.

Manuel rolled his eyes, the first movement from him since Kit had woken up. Kit was only slightly disappointed Manuel hadn’t turned into a statue-- it would have made him less punchable.

“Herondales are all arrogant bastards,” he said, waving his hand lazily. “It keeps them from seeing what’s right in front of them. Don’t tell me you’re stupid enough not to see how useful you are.”

Kit bristled at that-- both at the implication that Manuel of all people was calling him stupid, and at the implication he was a weapon.

“I’m not a weapon,” he said. “Though I wish you luck for trying your best to get me to comply. Really. I wouldn’t embarrass myself trying, but.” He shrugged.

“Cut him free,” Zara told the man who’d grabbed his hair and punched him.

Kit blinked, letting the words register. “Wait, really? It was that easy? Man, you guys kinda suck at this--”

He was interrupted by another punch, this one sure to leave a bruise.

“Don’t talk,” the man huffed.

“No, I don’t think I will,” Kit snapped. “You really think I’m going to lis--”

A girl standing close to him pulled out her stele and drew a Rune of Quietude, immediately muting his words. Kit tried to protest, throwing every insult he knew at her, but no words came out. He felt himself freak out a little, but forced himself to calm down.

The guy quickly untied his ankles, then his arms, before pulling his hands roughly behind his back and tying them with coarse rope, more tightly probably just for fun. Kit was not amused.

He was pushed out of the room, flanked by the Cohort on all sides. It was useless-- he had no idea where the exit was.

“We know Shadowhunters,” Manuel said. “We know they won’t comply willingly, not even under torture. But we also know their loyalty to their people.”

Kit wanted to snap at them how hypocritical it was of them-- fellow Shadowhunters-- to imply they would use their own people’s loyalty against them to blackmail them, but he still couldn’t say a word.

He was led down a hall and through another door that led to a square room with only a slim rectangle of a window that served as the only source of light, identical to the one he’d been previously locked in. and sitting in the middle of the room, tied to a chair and still unconscious, was Julian.

Kit’s heart seemed to stop beating, and he stopped breathing. Kit called Julian’s name silently, screaming his throat raw, but not a single sound leaving his lips. He struggled against the ropes and the hands holding him back, but they didn’t move an inch.

Manuel went over and forcefully shook Julian awake. Julian groaned, his head rolling, his eyes blinking sluggishly. He became aware of his surroundings quicker than Kit had. He was alert and struggling against his bindings.

“Don’t bother,” Manuel said in a bored tone. “You won’t be getting out of those. Even if you did, I wouldn’t suggest it.”

Julian looked up at Manuel, and his eyes almost immediately snapped to Kit’s and his expression shifted to worry, concern, anger. Kit flinched back. Julian hadn’t changed much-- his skin was tanner, his early worry lines a little more faded, less prominent, his eyes and hair so unlike Ty’s, but so much like Dru’s and Tavvy’s. And Livvy’s. Julian was right to be angry at him. He’d left them without even saying so much as ‘goodbye’. He hadn’t been thinking straight at the time, but later, he’d deemed it too dangerous for them for him to go back and properly apologize. So he hadn’t. But now he realized it was useless. They’d still use the Blackthorns against him. Kit blinked the tears of frustration and desperation away.

“What do you want?” Julian spat. “Let him go.”

Kit’s captor’s hands moved from holding his arms to wrapping around the back of his neck. The feeling made Kit shudder involuntarily.

Kit looked at Julian and tried to give him his most sincerest look of apology. It was his fault they were in this mess.

“Don’t worry,” Zara said, her eyes fixed on Kit. “We have no reason to hurt you. Yet. Not if he complies.”

Kit sagged. Julian looked at him with a fierceness in his gaze.

“Don’t listen to them,” he told Kit. “Don’t--”

Manuel hit Julian in the temple with the hilt of his dagger, and Julian hissed softly. Kit called Manuel a very unflattering name that would have probably only served to piss him off more if he could speak.

Julian fixed his eyes on Kit, frowning in confusion, his eyes searching. They found the Rune of Quietude quickly. His eyes darkened, fury pulling at his features.

“If you want something out of him, forcing him into silent defeats the whole purpose,” he snarled at them. “Take that rune off.”

He was ignored.

“See, Christopher?” Zara asked him. “We can hurt them. We won’t hesitate. We don’t even need much from you. All we need is your magic.” Kit glared at her. “We want to unify the Shadowhunters. But for this, we need them to listen, and to obey, for their own good. We need to bring them back to Alicante. Your magic is unlike any out there. We just need you to _persuade_ the Shadowhunters to come back to Idris. And then we can work on subduing the faeries and downworlders and you can go back to… whatever you were doing.”

Kit spat at her, and Zara stumbled back. She scowled, wiping the spit from her face.

The guy holding Kit’s neck released him before punching him right in the kidney. His reaction was immediate. The pain made his legs buckle and he collapsed to the ground with a strangled gasp of pain, his knees banging painfully on the hard floor. His hands reached instinctively to wrap themselves around his middle, but his hands were still restrained by the rope, his fingers numb and the rope rubbing painfully against his wrists. His side was on fire and his mind was blank with pain. Someone twisted their hands through his hair and yanked, but the pain of it was washed away by the painful throbbing in his side. His breathing came out in harsh pants and Julian was calling his name, he noticed once the ringing in his ears subsided.

“Defiance won’t get you anywhere,” Zara said casually, standing over him, almost triumphant. “You Herondales never learn that, but you could always be the first.”  
Kit was struggling to breathe, every breath painful. He still didn’t understand how one punch could hurt this much.

“The next time, it won’t be you we’ll hurt.” Kit’s eyes snapped to Zara’s instantly.

She smirked, knowing she’d finally gotten his attention.

“You can remove the runes now. You’ll find him much more cooperative.”

Julian spat a curse at her, but she barely gave him a glance.

“Kit, are you okay?” Julian asked, his anger receding into concern.

Kit felt the tears burning behind his eyes again, but couldn’t reply. Someone was removing the Rune of Quietude, but even then, he didn’t know what to tell Julian. It was too late for an apology. He’d been an idiot, and losing the Blackthorns and Emma had been entirely his own doing.

“Are we ready to negotiate?” Zara asked.

Kit’s face was sore from the runes, his wrists burned and his whole torse felt numb. He glared at Zara for a moment, his breathing raspy and shallow. He broke eye contact first, sagging in his captor’s hold.

“Yeah,” he mumbled, voice cracking slightly.

“We’re done here, then,” she said, standing up from her crouched position. “Take him back to his room.”

He was pulled to his feet, but his legs buckled again and he collapsed with a grunt of pain, renewed pain burning through his side. Someone took a firm hold of him and dragged him back to his feet and dragged him out the door and down the hall. The previous procession didn’t follow, though Kit knew it was useless for it. He couldn’t run away. He was exhausted and each step sent a rolling wave of pain coursing through his body and searing his nerves.

The dude who’d been manhandling him all day-- without even having the decency of presenting himself-- tossed Kit in his room and locked the door behind him, not bothering to untie Kit. kit spat a string of curses at the closed door. He had lost all feeling in his arms by this point. He moved himself upright and dragged himself into a corner of the room, his whole middle section screaming in protest.

He rested his warm and flushed cheek against the cool wall and closed his eyes, his body shutting down from exhaustion and pain.

* * *

Kit was shaken awake, which didn’t really wake him up. What woke him up was the flare of pain the jostling sent through his body. He cried out and whoever was shaking his shoulder let him go and cursed quietly.

“Kit!”

The voice was familiar, Kit thought, eyes fluttering. But he was too tired for this.

“Kit, wake up! The Cohort could come back at any moment.”

Kit pried his eyes open and blinked sluggishly at the person in front of him. Her sunshine blonde hair was pulled back in a ponytail and her face was set in a grim line, despite the worry in her hazel eyes. Crouching next to her was Jem, his hair dark, with a silver streak running through.

“Hi Jem,” Kit mumbled. “Did you find Julian?”

He didn’t feel alarm. Maybe he should, but he felt exhausted and just wanted to go back to sleep. Feeling was returning to him, new pains and aches he didn’t have earlier waking him up faster. He was cold and shivering, and his head hurt.

The girl, it was Emma, Kit remembered, spoke up. “Yeah. he’s outside. We’re gonna take you outside, too. The Cohort is fleeing. Magnus is here.”

It came back to him. He sat up, a blinding pain overtaking him and making the world go white.

“Can’t….move,” Kit said through gritted teeth.

Emma pulled out her stele and drew an _iratze_ on his arm. He noticed it was the second one, the first one barely fading.

The pain lessened to a more manageable level and he accepted Emma’s hand and she hoisted him up. He leaned heavily against her, slightly worried he’d hold her back when fighting, but it turned out Emma was ruthless in combat against the few remaining Cohort whether or not she had an exhausted teenager hanging off her or not.

“I’m sorry,” Kit whispered the moment they stumbled outside.

“Why?” Emma asked, hobbling to the trees with Kit, Jem bringing up the rear.

“For leaving without saying goodbye. I’m sorry. I wanted to apologize, but--”

“It’s okay, Kit,” she said softly, leading him to the clearing where the others were waiting to portal back to Los Angeles. “We forgive you.”

Kit was doubtful, but altogether too tired to care. He just needed to see Julian unharmed and maybe Tessa for reassurance, and he’d be fine.

They broke through the trees and the others immediately turned to see who had come through. There were cries of relief when they saw Kit, and his attention was drawn to Tessa, who called his name and ran forward.

Kit broke away from Emma and managed two steps before crumpling into Tessa’s arm.

“Kit,” she murmured, hugging him fiercely.

“I love you,” he mumbled before immediately being overtaken by a bout of dizziness that pulled him over the edge of consciousness.

**Author's Note:**

> you may be wondering how the Cohort got out of Idris. valid question. well, kids, author does not know nor cares to elaborate. sorry ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


End file.
